Duke celebrates after beating Louisville in the Battle for Atlantis championship game last November

INDIANAPOLIS – Future ACC rivals Duke and Louisville will play each other Sunday at Lucas Oil Stadium for the NCAA West Region championship and a trip to next week’s Final Four.

It’s not the first time this season, however, that the Blue Devils and Cardinals have played with a trophy on the line. They also met on Nov. 24 in a hotel ballroom in the Bahamas for the title of the Battle For Atlantis tournament.

The Blue Devils built an 11-point lead in the second half before the Cardinals, who were playing without injured center Gorgui Dieng, rallied. A Peyton Siva 3-pointer put Louisville ahead 59-58 before point guard Quinn Cook took over to score 11 of his 15 points and lead Duke to the victory.

Cook ended up scoring his team’s final eight points to hold off the Cardinals and earn tournament MVP honors.

Quinn Cook was the MVP of the Battle For Atlantis

Given Cook’s struggles in Friday’s region semifinal victory against Michigan State – he went 0 for 5 from the floor with three turnovers and only two assists in 21 minutes before being benched in favor of Tyler Thornton – the memory of that MVP performance could be just what the doctor ordered in Sunday’s rematch with the Cardinals.

“I’m coming into the game with confidence playing against two great guards in Russ Smith and Peyton Siva,” Cook said. “Our guards know we have to be at the best of our game.”

In the Bahamas, it was a battle for all 40 minutes. We know it’s going to be a battle all 40 minutes (again Sunday).”

Cook and his Blue Devils (30-5) aren’t the only ones who can look back at the game in the Bahamas in a positive light. Louisville (32-5) can also gain confidence in that it came so close to beating Duke without one of its best players in the lineup.

Dieng, a 6-foot-11 junior, was a preseason All-Big East selection before suffering a broken wrist that forced him to miss seven games. Now fully healthy, he averages 10.0 points, 9.5 rebounds and 2.4 blocks per game.

As much as Dieng can impact a game with his defense, on the boards and with his low post scoring ability, Louisville coach Rick Pitino isn’t as convinced as most that his addition will dramatically alter the way Sunday’s rematch plays out.

“I know he’s obviously better than Zach Price and Stephan Van Treese, but both of those guys played terrific in that game,” Pitino said. “If one of those guys had played poorly, you could say it’s going to be a big difference. There’s so much at stake in the game because it means the Final Four that really past performance doesn’t mean a whole lot.”

At the same time, though, the familiarity the teams gained with one another from that earlier meeting can’t help but aid their preparations, given the short turnaround from Friday’s region semifinals.

Mason Plumlee will find the going tougher against Gorgui Dieng on Sunday than he did against Luke Hancock in November

“It helps that you were at the same party together. This is a bigger party,” Krzyzewski said. “We have great respect for them. Their guards lived in our paint and they’ve lived in a lot of people’s paint over the years.

“They’re better. We’re better. … The fact that we won is not significant. The fact that we have some familiarity with them helps.”

How much it helps is relative, given how much the teams have evolved since that first meeting and the stakes that are involved with the one that’s upcoming.

“That was also a long time ago,” Duke’s Ryan Kelly said of the Battle Four Atlantis. “A lot of things have changed for both teams.

“We’ve gone through ups-and-downs, through injuries. But we’re in a position now where both teams are approaching it as though it’s a clean slate. We both believe we’re going to play at a high level.”